US Supreme Court to Rule on Cross in Californian National Preserve

The issue of separation of the church and the state is once again knocking at the doors of the US Supreme Court. It is to rule whether a cross to honor fallen soldiers can stand in a national preserve in California.

Even as religious revivalism is growing across the country, judges in the apex court are called upon time and again to decide on how far the state can be allowed to promote Christianity, even if symbolically.

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Four years ago, then-Justice Sandra Day O'Connor cast a fifth and deciding vote against the display of the Ten Commandments in a Kentucky courthouse. She said such a public display of a religious message violated the 1st Amendment because it amounted to a government endorsement of religion.

The First Amendment to the United States Constitution is the part of the United States Bill of Rights that expressly prohibits the United States Congress from making laws "respecting an establishment of religion"

In dissent, the court's conservatives said religious displays on public land generally do not violate the 1st Amendment, since no one is forced to listen to a religious message or participate in a religious event.

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A year later, O'Connor retired and was replaced by Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., President Bush's second appointee, who could form a new majority on religion.

At issue is an eight-foot-tall cross in the Mojave National Preserve in San Bernardino County. A smaller wooden cross was first erected by the Veterans of Foreign Wars in 1934 and was originally maintained as a war memorial by the National Park Service.

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The American Civil Liberties Union objected to the cross and filed a suit on behalf of Frank Buono, a Catholic and former Park Service employee. The suit noted that the government had denied a request to have a Buddhist shrine erected near the cross.

Two years ago, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled for the ACLU and declared the cross an "impermissible governmental endorsement of religion."

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Congress had intervened to save the cross. It ordered the Interior Department to transfer to the VFW one acre of land where the cross stood. The 9th Circuit judges were unswayed, however.

Bush administration lawyers appealed to the Supreme Court last fall and said the "seriously misguided decision" would require the government "to tear down a cross that has stood without incident for 70 years as a memorial to fallen service members."

The government also questioned Buono's standing to challenge the cross, since he lives in Oregon and suffers no obvious harm because of the Mojave cross.

Now various conservative groups are arguing that 9th Circuit's ruling, if allowed to stand, could trigger legal challenges to the display of crosses at Arlington National Cemetery and elsewhere.

The court said it had voted to hear the case, now relabeled Salazar vs. Buono. Arguments will be heard in October, and Obama administration lawyers will be in charge of defending the presence of the cross, David G. Savage wrote, reporting for Los Angeles Times.

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